


Beyond All Blessings

by gendzl



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Gen, Grief/Mourning, I can should must and will make my favorite characters Jewish, Jewish Character, Past Character Death, Post-Nogitsune, This is a very short fic about very large grief
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-02
Updated: 2020-04-02
Packaged: 2021-03-01 04:08:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23438959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gendzl/pseuds/gendzl
Summary: Allison’s headstone hasn’t arrived yet. Chris isn’t entirely sure he even ordered one. In its place is a small plastic card, six inches across with dark green text, shoved into the grass. It’s bare but for her name. No dates. Chris doesn’t want to look at the dates. The dates are fucking depressing.Chris shoves Stiles out of his guilt and into his grief.
Relationships: Chris Argent & Stiles Stilinski
Comments: 2
Kudos: 21





	Beyond All Blessings

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: I've never seen the show (only read fic) so idk how canon noncompliant/OOC this is except for the obvious fact that I made people who aren't Jewish very much Jewish. I have no idea what I've read that's canon vs. fanon and I'm not gonna do research for 700 words of religious catharsis. I was experiencing an emotion and pursued it in this direction. That's all! Hopefully it makes at least a marginal amount of sense. :)
> 
> Also, yes, the quotes from Psalm 69 are incomplete and entirely removed from context. I know. Don't @ me.

_Deliver me, O God, for the waters have reached my neck;  
_ _I am weary with calling; my throat is dry; my eyes fail while I wait for God._

_—Psalm 69_

* * *

The only tolerable thing about tragedy is that Jews have ritualized it and made it into something familiar; a process for moving through it without letting it drown you.

Take your grief and sit in it. Stew in it without feeling guilty for taking the time. You are _obligated_ to take this time. But only do so for this long, and then get up and continue on.

Say these words, this way, at these times, with these people, and don’t worry about the rest.

It’s not easy, it will never be _easy_ , but he’s grateful that his mother gave him this. Grateful that, no matter how much his father tried to take it, he never managed.

It helps.

And because he knows how much it helps, Chris finds himself at the Sheriff’s front door after Allison’s death, after shiva, after he has pulled the shroud of grief far enough off himself to start to manage someone else’s. Call it a mitzvah. Call it a peace offering. Call it whatever you want.

He knocks firmly, and rocks back on his heels while he waits. It takes a while, and when Stiles answers the door, he sees Chris’ face and flinches. Chris ignores it, doesn’t say anything, just extends a hand in a sharp gesture that says “follow me” and walks back to his car.

Stiles stands frozen in the doorway for a moment before haphazardly shoving his bare feet into a ratty pair of shoes and rocketing down the driveway into the passenger seat. Chris would bet good money he’s shoved at least one of the tongues down into the toe.

It’s quiet in the car.

It’s been quiet for a week now. Chris hates it. It’s polite for people not to speak to mourners unless they speak first. You don’t get as many meaningless platitudes that way, sure, but sometimes the silence is worse. Especially when you can’t bring yourself to speak at all.

Especially when you don’t know which of you is the designated mourner.

“Come on,” Chris says, reaching into the back seat for the books he’d stacked there earlier.

Stiles is standing next to the door of the car looking like he wants to climb back in, or burrow down beneath the grave dirt. Chris puts a hand on his shoulder and steers him deeper into the cemetery before he has a chance to do either.

Allison’s headstone hasn’t arrived yet. Chris isn’t entirely sure he even ordered one. In its place is a small plastic card, six inches across with dark green text, shoved into the grass. It’s bare but for her name. No dates. Chris doesn’t want to look at the dates. The dates are fucking depressing.

(He ignores Victoria’s grave entirely.)

He passes one of the books to Stiles, who barely glances at the cover before flipping it so the spine is on the right. The work of habit.

Good. He’s not completely new at this, then.

“Page 53,” he says.

They don’t have a minyan. There aren’t enough Jews left in Beacon Hills to make a minyan.

Chris is okay making a minyan with the dead.

Their voices merge in the air over Allison’s grave, occasionally wavering, breaking, but never halting.

_Yitgadal v’yitkadash sh’mei raba  
b’alma di v’ra chirutei, v’yamlich malchutei,   
b’chayeichon uv’yomeichon uv’chayei d’chol beit Yisrael,  
ba’agala uviz’man kariv, v’im’ru:Amen._

_Y’hei sh’mei raba m’varach l’alam ul’almei almaya._

_Yitbarach v’yishtabach v’yitpa’ar v’yitromam v’yitnasei,  
v’yit’hadar v’yitaleh v’yit’halal sh’mei d’kud’sha b’rich hu,   
l’eila min kol birchata v’shirata, tushb’chata v’nechemata,   
da’amiran b’alma, v’imru:Amen._

_Y’hei sh’lama raba min sh’maya, v’chayim aleinu v’al kol Yisrael, v’imru: Amen.  
Oseh shalom bimromav, Hu ya’aseh shalom aleinu, v’al kol Yisrael, v’imru: Amen._

Together they make it through the prayer for the dead that never mentions death, and then they linger there in silence.

Standing shoulder-to-shoulder as they are, Chris feels it when Stiles finally starts crying. He brings one arm up in an awkward facsimile of a hug, and he supports the boy’s weight as he lets himself grieve.

* * *

_Rescue me from the mire; let me not sink._   
_Let the floodwaters not sweep me away;  
let the deep not swallow me._

_Answer me._

_—Psalm 69  
_


End file.
